broken radiator fans?

[shepards71]

ok, here is my problem my 96 voyager overheats. changed out the fan relay and replaced the heat sensor. still not working. i then created a bypass to manually turn the fans on from inside the van. it worked for a few minutes then the wires started to burn. when i looked at the harness that i disconected, it too looked a bit burned. when the fans where running with the bypass they where making a kind of weird noise and i thought i could see sparks from inside the fan but i am not sure. do you think the fans need to be replaced? what would cause the wire to burn? thanks in advance.

[Airjer_]

Too much current draw from bad fans will make the wires hot/melt/burn.

[shepards71]

thanks for the quick response. Is there a way to test the fans to see if they are bad. voltage meter? I have never used a voltage meter before!

[Spit]

You would need an amp-meter to measure what you need to measure..

Not sure how you ran the fans direct...straight from the battery? How heavy of wire did you use? assuming it was the same gauge as the fan wiring harness, if the wires overheated sounds like the fans are drawing way to much current

Note: When ever you jump something like you did with the fans...it should be with a fused jumper. so that if it excedes the rated amperage the fuse blows. You can get a cheap little in-line fuse holder at any auto parts store, and put in what ever size of fuse the circuit is normally protected at.

Spit

[shepards71]

fixed. replaced the fan assembly and the fan relay. all good now thanks guys.